Note: This is a copy of a Tuesday email from Anderson County Commissioner Myron Iwanski to the Budget Committee and commissioners.

Budget Committee and Commissioners:

I think we were all pleased that for the fourth year in a row our year-end fund balance increased over the previous year. We owe a big thank you to our county employees for helping making this happen.

Four years ago, our fund balance was heading down to less than $500,000, and our credit rating was being effected. Beginning four years ago, by being more cautious with how we spend fund balance money and with the help of all our elected officials and employees, we increased the fund balance to the current $4,290,000.

One of the many things we did to turn this around was not giving our employees a salary increase for several years—except to cover the annual increases in health insurance cost. County-wide office holders, meanwhile, were given state-mandated increases in salaries.

I propose using a small portion of this fund balance to provide a small lump sum payment to those county general fund employees that did not get a state-mandated salary increase. [Read more…]